


Dominoes

by Rynn336



Category: Shingeki no Kyojin | Attack on Titan
Genre: Angst, M/M, Sad, canonverse
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-01-13
Updated: 2016-01-13
Packaged: 2018-05-13 18:47:21
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,941
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5713159
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Rynn336/pseuds/Rynn336
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Erwin is as constant as the sun. But what happens when the sun is gone?</p>
            </blockquote>





	Dominoes

**Author's Note:**

> Hi guys! Sorry if this isn't very good...but whatever you think, let me know in the comments! Any feedback is greatly appreciated!

Levi is no stranger to pain.

Pain is just a natural part of life, after all. An alarm bell, a warning system to let him know when he needs to take a step back and assess the situation. It tells him when his thin veneer of control is slowly cracking, broken fragments tumbling through his grasping fingers.

He’s spent his whole life in control. Life is unpredictable, a wild roller coaster of cause and effect and effect and effect, a long line of dominoes stretching across a tiny, invisible little inch of the infinity of the universe. But Levi’s learned that if he distributes his weight evenly, purposefully, across the balance of caution and impulsiveness, he can throw one of those dominoes just a hair’s breadth out of place, each tile pulled back and forth with careful precision until he creates the path he desires. When an outside force throws it off, he’ll adjust his little dominoes to accommodate it so that, while maybe it’s unexpected, he’s still fully in control of the situation. Pain is there to tell him when he’s forgotten to make the proper adjustments, warning him just before it’s too late to spin the world in his favor.

But while he’s found ways to keep just within reach of his control at all times, while he’s used to unexpected events nearly pulling the floor out from under him, nothing could’ve prepared him for this message from the front of the formation. After all he’s been through, he never thought mere words would be able to wrench all control and direction from his desperate fingers and set his whole world into a downward spiral. Words.

His hands tighten so much around his reins that his knuckles turn white, a color that he’s certain his face has already taken on; it seems like all of his blood has flooded out of his brain, leaving only a simple, pounding thought. Dead. Dead. Dead, in perfect rhythm with the staccato thud of the horse’s hooves beneath him. The world flies by in a blur of green and white and blue, and the wind rips the air from his lungs, leaving him gasping for breath, but he doesn’t care. He only rides faster. He can see a few figures standing alone on the grass ahead, and he knows he’s reached his destination. He doesn’t slow down, though, and in a few short seconds he’s upon them, yanking unnecessarily roughly on his reins and halting the horse in its tracks. A couple of faces look up at him in surprise and fear. “Levi…” Hanji’s voice is low, devoid of any of her usual crazy, wonder-filled excitement, he hardly hears her. His attention is fixed on Erwin.

He’s never understood what people meant by the dead looking peaceful.

The commander is sprawled on his back, the lower half of his body completely gone save for a massive bloodstain and a few tiny shreds of torn flesh scattered here and there. He’s staring at the sky, his lifeless, pallid face twisted into a mask of terror, cornflower blue eyes wide and helpless as though pleading for help from some invisible rescuer. The hot stench of blood and death slam into the back of Levi’s throat, almost gagging him, but as he stumbles down from his horse, he can’t take his eyes off of Erwin’s.

* * *

  _“Hello,” Erwin’s voice said behind him, his voice croaky from sleep._

_Levi whirled around, his eyes wide. His boots made quiet scuffing noises on the stone battlement. Erwin stood there at the door, hardly more than a silhouette against the bright yellow light in the building behind him, but Levi could see the corners of his eyes turned up slightly in an amused smile. “Shit,” Levi hissed. “Did I wake you?”_

* * *

 “Levi,” Hanji says again, more of a warning in her voice this time, but Levi ignores her again, simply staggering forward to half-kneel, half-fall to the ground next to Erwin, his hands shaking. He can’t tell if he’s angry or sad or anything else; all he feels is numb. It almost feels surreal, too, everything around him hazy and muffled like a dream, and if he pinches himself hard enough, or if he hurts himself somehow, he’ll wake up beside Erwin like he always does.

He feels for a pulse in Erwin’s neck, not sure why. He can see him, he knows the man is dead, but somehow the sight alone is not enough for his brain. He needs absolute assurance that what he sees before him is real before his brain can even begin to process this situation.

This isn’t how it was supposed to happen.

* * *

  _"Yes,” Erwin answered, walking forward and shutting the door behind him. Without the light behind him, his features were more clear—his high cheekbones, his strong jaw, his thick eyebrows, his bright eyes. His hair, mussed from sleep, fell unnoticed across his forehead, every strand bathed in silver by the moonlight. “It’s fine, though.”_

_Levi watched him uncertainly before nodding hesitantly and sitting down on the edge of the battlement. Erwin did the same, and they sat in silence for a long moment until Erwin said, “So, you come out here a lot.” It wasn’t a question._

_Levi wondered how many times he’d woken Erwin up when he left the room before, and he felt a stab of guilt. “Yeah.”_

_“Why?”_

_He shrugged and looked up at the stars. “Why did you come find me?”_

_“I was curious.”_

_“You were also up all night last night doing paperwork. I’m sorry I woke you, but you should go back to sleep.” Erwin chuckled, but didn’t say anything, and Levi glanced over at him. “What?” he demanded._

_“Nothing.” Erwin met his eyes, and Levi frowned. “I’ll ask again. Why are you out here?”_

_“I couldn’t sleep.”_

_“Are you thinking about them?”_

_Levi sighed. Erwin knew him too well. He shrugged, but he knew that no answer would be answer enough for Erwin._

_“Tell me something, Levi.” Erwin studied him carefully. “Why do you think about them so often like this?”_

_Levi frowned. “Because…they were my friends?” he asked, unsure why that wasn’t obvious._

_“Well, yes, but if every soldier thought about their dead friends as often as you do, I think nearly all of the sleeping quarters would go almost unused. So why?”_

_How was he supposed to answer this? He stared at Erwin, not quite comprehending. “Why does it matter?”_

_“Am I not allowed to be curious? After all…” He trailed off, but Levi didn’t need him to complete his sentence._

_Levi just sighed. “I guess their deaths just bother me, is all.”_

_“Well, yes, I could tell you that. Your friends died. Of course that’s going to bother you. But why do you come out here almost every night just to think about them? Do you find pleasure in reliving the deaths of your closest friends? Do you still blame yourself? Or is it something more?”_

_Levi glared at him. “You don’t mince words, do you?”_

_“You’re certainly one to talk.”_

_Even in the dark, Levi could see that the corners of Erwin’s mouth were turned up in the slightest hint of a smile. Levi stared at him for a long moment. “I guess I am,” he said finally._

_“So?”_

_“God damn it, you’re persistent. I don’t know, okay? This is just how it is.”_

_Erwin sighed and nodded. “Alright, then let me offer an answer of my own. If soldiers like them can die so easily, you’re scared of what could happen to everyone else. To people less gifted than them.” Levi stared at him._

* * *

 “Levi!” Hanji says again just as a stab of pain shoots through his hand, interrupting his thoughts. He looks down at the offending palm and realizes that he’s curling his hand into a fist so hard the nails have cut into his skin, blood trickling through his fingers and dripping to the ground.

“What happened?” he asks, finally speaking, as he stands up and turns around, wiping his hand on his shirt. Even to his ears, his voice sounds hoarse, low.

Hanji’s eyes are filled with an emotion he’s never seen in her before, the unfamiliarity of the sight making it hard to place. “Titan,” is all she says.

He raises an eyebrow. He could’ve told her that. “No fucking shit,” he says bitterly. “Is it dead?”

She shakes her head. “I don’t know. The recruit shadowing Erwin was so scared when he came to tell us what happened that I have no idea about the details. All she could tell us was that Erwin was dead.”

Anger surges through him and he clenches his jaw tightly, nearly biting his tongue. “Where is the brat?”

Her eyes go wide. “It wasn’t her fault, Levi,” she says hurriedly.

“Where is she?”

She stares at him in astonishment before crossing her arms. “I won’t tell you,” she says calmly.

“Why not?”

“Erwin wouldn’t want you to do anything rash. Especially not to a new recruit. She’s fifteen, Levi.”

“I don’t give a fuck how old she is!” he spits. Somewhere in the back of his mind he knows this is wrong, knows this is unfair, but he can’t stop. “How the fuck would you know what he would’ve wanted? He’s fucking dead! It doesn’t matter anymore!”

“You don’t believe that.”

“He’s fucking dead and it’s over! It’s fucking over! We’re all fucked and the Corps is fucked and humanity is fucked and he’s fucking de—”

“Levi!”

He blinks. She’s staring at him, her eyes wide, and suddenly he can hear himself, hear how crazed he sounds. He exhales heavily, and it takes all of his self-control not to fall to his knees. “Oh, god. I'm sorry,” he breathes.

She sets a tentative hand on his shoulder. “Levi…”

* * *

  _“Not everyone else,” he said finally, quietly._

_“Yourself, then?”_

_“I don’t know. I don’t care if I die.”_

_“But not in a pointless way like that, right?”_

_“Do you have any idea how many lines you're crossing?”_

_Erwin smiled a little. Sadly. “I know, I'm sorry.”_

_“But you won’t stop.”_

_“No.”_

_Levi nodded slowly. “Yeah. Not in a pointless way like that.” Erwin was probably the only person who could ever talk to him like this without having his limbs ripped off._

_“Are you worried about anyone else?”_

_He paused. “Yeah.”_

* * *

 He was worried about Erwin, but now, as he sits on the edge of the battlement again, staring up at the sky, he knows that some part of him really never expected Erwin to die. Erwin was as constant as the sunlight filtering through the window every morning, as constant as the groggy mumbles of the Corps yanking themselves from the relentless clutches of sleep, as constant as birdsong in summer and rain in a rainstorm and the presence of words on every page of the book Levi would read over and over again, curled neatly against Erwin’s body, as they tried not-so-desperately to go to sleep. But now Erwin is gone. And now Levi feels like all of those things—the sun, the noise, the birds, the rain—have been ripped away from him, stripping him of anything he had left to prove his humanity and leaving a skeleton and some flesh and a burning desire to kill every last Titan in existence. He thinks he knows how Eren feels, even more than before.

But, he remarks to himself, the sun might be gone, but the moon is still there, giving out just barely enough light to see by. “Yeah, Erwin,” he says quietly. “I was worried about you.”

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks for reading!


End file.
